


The Answer To His Prayers

by Anonymous



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Blood Loss, Body Horror, Castiel Rescues Dean Winchester, Emotionally Hurt Dean Winchester, Forced Nudity (Partial), Gen, Guilty Dean Winchester, Hurt Dean Winchester, Protective Castiel (Supernatural), Sad Castiel (Supernatural), Semi Naked Dean Winchester, Tied-Up Dean Winchester, Torture, Unhappy Ending, leeches
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-03
Updated: 2020-01-03
Packaged: 2021-02-18 22:16:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22100698
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: Trying to find someone, anyone, who can help them fight Chuck, Dean ends up caught by some creature that has a novel way of feeding on her captives.Hurt and desperate, Dean knows he has no right to expect Cas to come help him, but he prays anyway.And, maybe, if Cas does come, he’ll have a chance to make things right with the angel.
Relationships: Castiel & Dean Winchester
Kudos: 40
Collections: Supernatural Anon Kink Meme





	The Answer To His Prayers

**Author's Note:**

> Please note, before you read further, that this is no happy ending in this story in the sense of a reconciliation between Dean and Cas. Maybe another time, but not just now.

It was dark when Dean woke up. The ragged curtains covering the windows of the small cabin cast uneven streams of moonlight on the dirty floor, and that made his heart sink.

It had been early afternoon when he’d pulled up, which meant he’d been unconscious at least eight to ten hours.

Still dazed, he tried to sit up, but something bit into his neck, wrists, and ankles, when he jerked in surprise.

Rope. He was tied down with rope, heavy knots cinched tight around him.

That was when he heard someone shuffling around, and an off key humming from somewhere out of his sight.

“Hey,” he said, because whoever it was had to know he was awake, and he wanted to know what the hell was going on.

He’d come here because he’d heard a rumour through the network that somebody lived out in this rickety old place (Dean had doubted _anybody_ did when he first eyeballed it as he drove up) who might know a way to rein in Chuck.

How he’d gone from getting out of his car (and he vaguely remembers, then, knocking on the front door, and that was it) to waking up like this was a mystery and he didn’t like not knowing what had happened in between...well, some of it was obvious given his current predicament…..and what was going to happen _next_.

He was a little more worried about that, since he hadn’t told Sam where he was going, or why, and that meant Sam might not even know he was in trouble yet. Or if he did, where he was in trouble unless he’d thought to track Dean’s phone.

“Hello, hey, answer me!”

The shuffling came closer, and Dean jerked in surprise when a figure leaned over him.

His breath caught in his throat and for a minute he was sure he’d hit his head and this was all just some concussion induced hallucination.

The creature standing over him looked like something right out of a kid’s fairytale, the kind where the witches were old and crooked, and had sharp noses with warts at the end.

One eye was closed over, almost flat, and Dean got the impression they’d be a gaping hole in there if the eyelid was raised; the other was black, and looking down at him in a way he didn’t like at all.

“Well, it speaks.”

It...no, she stepped back. It was definitely a she because now Dean could see she was also naked, completely, and her body was emaciated to the point it hurt to look at her; the bones in her arms and legs were like spindles, and he didn’t know how her hips and ribs hadn’t just sliced through the wrinkled papery skin.

“What…”

“Are you doing here?” The voice was low and husky, as if its owner had a twenty a day habit for longer than he’d been alive. “Or what am I?’

“Either. Both. Look, I was just…. I got lost, and I just needed directions.”

He had a feeling this person was not going to be a potential ally, and he was more worried about getting out of there than a lie affecting any future agreement.

She laughed, the sound like marbles rolling, crackling, against her ribs.

“Of course you did. And you come to my house, and knock on my door. No one does that, boy. No one visits me anymore, which is a shame because I like some company as much as the next person.”

Dean bit his lip, not saying what he was thinking: if this was how she treated guests, he could understand why nobody came around to see her.

“So maybe you could just let me go.”

Again, that laughter, and yeah, okay, he supposed it was pretty funny. Something told him even before he asked that he was in deep shit, but while he was talking to her, he was also testing the ropes around him, working his wrists in slow turns, and up and down, looking to loosen them even just a little.

“I will,” she said. “When I’m done.”

She was off pottering around the cabin, and Dean saw her lifting a large rectangular box onto a trolley, and putting something else down beside it, before wheeling it over to him.

She looked like a walking skeleton, but she had strength. How else had she managed to get him in this position? He still coudln’t remember, but he doubted he’d just walked in and lay down for her so she could tie him up.

Maybe she was a witch, or something else, but Dean knew he needed help and fast.

Tied down, with his phone out of his reach (he spied his jacket, with his phone and keys in the pocket, hanging over a chair; on the table next to it were both his guns and his knife, so he was without anything to help get himself out of the situation), left him only one way to get help.

And he’d slammed that door shut, hadn’t he.

Dammit.

He watched the woman stop the trolley, and then he saw her pick up a knife. It was old, made of what he guessed was bone instead of metal, serrated to create an ugly, uneven cutting edge.

“Wait,” he said, but she grabbed the bottom of his Henley and took the knife to it.

It tore rather than cut, but all the same it did the job, and his top fell to either side of his body. The shoulders were next; she tugged the knife down, the flat edge digging into his flesh until the all she had to do to bare him was yank away the torn pieces.

This was going places Dean didn’t want to contemplate, and he still hadn’t managed to loosen the ropes even a millimetre.

“What are you doing?” She put the knife down, and turned away to open up the box. He could only get glimpses as she turned one way and then the other, lifting something out and settling it down, and it looked like…

Jars. She was laying out jar, after jar, each one carved crudely out of stone, lidless and old.

He counted ten in total before she closed the box over and turned back to him.

“I don’t think you lost your way, boy,” she said. “But if you did I think you’re regretting it now. Unless of course you want to tell me why you really came out here.”

She glanced back at the table, at his guns and knife. 

Dean hesitated. He could tell her the truth, but given his current situation he didn’t imagine she’d suddenly apologise and let him go. But if she was the person he’d heard rumours of (and why the hell hadn’t he been told about _this_ part), then maybe it was a chance he had to take.

“Well, I’m sure you’ll tell me in a little while. I’m sure you’ll tell me anything I ask, offer me anything I want.”

That didn’t sound great.

“I’ll tell you now,” he said. “If you let me go.”

She ignored him, and picked up the first of the jars; reached in with long, bony fingers and fished around as if what she wanted wasn’t coming easily.

When she pulled her hand back, Dean felt lead form hard and cold in his stomach.

She was holding a leech. It was a big one, too; thin, but long, black and quivering and glistening, and he bucked against the ropes.

“Wait, okay, just fuck, wait, please.”

“I feed them,” she said, “and then they feed me.”

Dean yelled as she delicately applied the first one to just under his right nipple. He could feel it wriggling around, exploring, and he tried to sort out in his head all the shit he’d ever heard about leeches, what they’d do, how, the way to get them off (pointless right now, but he was going to get out of this) and what he’d need to do then.

He remember something about a bite, and extended bleeding, but apparently it didn’t hurt.

He guessed that part was wrong when it felt like somebody had shoved a needle right into his chest, and he cried out, left shuddering with the sudden pain.

The rope aside, he managed to raise his head enough to see the leech arched just below his nipple, head flattened out wide, slowly gorging itself on his blood.

And then he remembered the rest of the jars.

“Please,” he panted.

The woman grinned, but it just made her seem all the more awful, lips thin and blue over sharp teeth sticking out from receding gums.

She picked up another jar, and Dean struggled helplessly as a second leech was draped across his stomach. He was ready for the pain, that time, but it didn’t help.

“This will take a while,” she said. “So you can tell me what you came here for now, or later, but I’d do it before you get too weak to talk.”

She had eight more jars to go, and Dean thumped his head back against the table, trying to think through the pain and panic.

He needed somebody out here to get him, and fast.

_Cas_ , he prayed, squeezing his eyes shut and hoping Cas hadn’t shut down that channel, even if it was just to him. _Cas, please, I’m in trouble_.

++

She took her time applying the rest of the leeches. They were all around the same length, but she had Dean’s entire upper body to work with.

Some were on his arms, or his shoulders (she’d been careful to steer them away from his throat); one had bitten into his nipple and that had been fucking agony, before it broke away and went searching for something a little meatier and easier to feed on.

And maybe he was imagining it, but he was sure he could feel them fattening on his blood, the weight of them as they settled down while they gorged themselves.

When the first one dropped off, the witch picked it up, and held it in her palm for him to see; it was swollen and fat from his blood.

She smiled at him, then at it, and picked it up.

But it didn’t go back in the jar like Dean expected.

No.

Instead, she craned her neck and tilted back her head, opening her mouth wide and dangling the leech above her before she lowered it slowly between her lips and then let it go.

Dean gagged, watching her throat move as she swallowed it. When she looked back to him, there was a smear of blood on both her fingers and her lips.

She petted her stomach, grinning, and then pulled a chair over to sit and wait.

++

_I know you’re probably pissed at me. You’re right to be, okay, but I need you, Cas. There’s this...this cabin, and..I don’t know what she is, dude, so you gotta be careful when you…_

_Please come, Cas. Or if you don’t, if you can’t...at least call Sam for me._

_Just...don’t leave me out here. I need…_

_Cas, please_.

++

It was impossible to tell how long he’d lain there. His body was weak and fevered. Sweat beaded on every inch of him, and he wasn’t sure if it was blood loss, or pain, or an overdose of whatever chemicals those fucking things were dosing him with (had anybody ever been fed on by so many at once?) but either way he was a wreck.

Even if he managed to get free, now, reach his knife and gun, Dean knew he’d be easy to deal with.

Breathing felt too much of an effort; getting up from the table to fight or run…. Impossible.

But he kept praying to Cas, more out of desperation now than any hope the angel would come.

And what right did Dean have to expect help from Cas anyway?

He’d pretty much driven Cas away, and he wanted to cry when he remembered the look on Cas’s face as he’d finally told Dean some home truths.

_You’re dead to me_.

Why had he said that? He hadn’t meant it. If Cas had seen…. If Cas knew how bad he’d been doing after Lucifer killed the angel, Cas would never have for a minute thought Dean could possibly have been speaking from anywhere but fear and anger.

But Cas hadn’t been there to see it, and all Dean had shown him, told him, was that he wasn’t a part of their family.

He wasn’t wanted, was barely even needed, and that Dean blamed him for everything.

And none of that was true either, but once again he’d let his temper and his mouth and this goddamn bitter childish attitude of his ruin everything and drive away someone he loved.

Cas had been right.

Dean had Sam. He’d always have Sam, and he knew it; even when they fought, they were too twisted up in each other for either of them to leave for good.

No matter what was said or done, they always came back to each other.

And Cas had, as well, and maybe Dean had gotten too used to that. To be let off with saying and doing what he wanted, because no matter what damage he inflicted, they were his family and they’d never go, not really.

Except Cas had. Dean had finally pushed too hard and _broken_ him, and he had gone.

And now here he was, begging Cas to come back.

To rescue him.

What had happened to Cas always being there when things went wrong, eh? He hadn’t been there this time, and Dean was still in the shit and now had the gall to ask for help from the person he’d hurt so bad.

He’d deserve it if Cas left him to die here.

He groaned as another leech let go of him, and watched, sick and helpless, as the woman swallowed that one too. She dragged one narrow finger tip through the blood dribbling over Dean’s chest and stomach, and then leaned forward to lap at the worst of the open bites.

When he tried to pull away, she grabbed a fistful of his hair, and held him still.

“I don’t suppose you’ll last much more than a few more hours,” she said. “Which is a pity. But if you do, I”ll feed you back up, boy. Get you strong again. I have some more of these growing in the pond out back. When they’re ready and you are, we can do this all over again.”

He shut his eyes, wishing it was over already. Then she let go of his hair, and maybe she was going to leave him be for a while.

Maybe he’d be gone by the time she decided to come back for her next snack, but then he felt something change around him.

The cabin felt...charged, and a sudden cold gust of wind wafted over his body, making him shiver harder.

The door. The front door was open.

Dean opened his eyes.

“Who are you,” the woman screeched. “Get out. Get out!”

Cas strode towards her, eyes gleaming with Grace and rage, and he had his angel blade ready.

“Get away from him.”

She was either cocky, or an idiot, or too drunk on his blood to realise the danger she was in, but she charged Cas, and wrapped bony fingers around his throat.

Cas slammed his blade straight through her chest, and he was immediately sprayed with a thick black substance; it continued to pour from the wound and then from her mouth, as Cas pushed her dead body off his blade and let her fall.

It was blood. His blood, probably, and maybe the blood of whichever poor fucker had been the person to cross her path.

Dean shivered as Cas ran to him, and pressed a hand to his forehead.

“You’ll be alright. Don’t move while I get them off.”

Them? Oh, right. He’d lost count of how many leeches she’d eaten, and how many were still attached, but Cas held out his hand, and there was dull blue gleam, and then he made a flicking gesture with his fingers.

Dean heard several soft _plops_ , and then Cas was cupping his face with both hands.

Grace, like a gentle heat, moved through him, smothering the pain, fixing the blood loss, closing up each open bite, healing the chafing where Dean had struggled against the ropes.

“Cas,” he managed. 

“Yes,” Cas said. He tugged away the rope around Dean’s throat first, and then started pulling at the others. “I’m sorry I took so long; I was closer than Sam, but still not close enough to get here before…”

Dean shook his head. “No way you’ve have made it before the main event.” And it wasn’t like he’d even expected Cas to come at all. “Cas, I…”

Cas wasn’t looking at him. He finished the ropes, and pulled Dean into a sitting up position, holding him there until he was less dizzy from going from prone for several hours to being upright.

“Your shirt...Oh.” He spotted the torn sections on the floor, and took off his overcoat and blazer.

“Cas,” Dean said.

Cas slipped the blazer over Dean’s arms, and then grabbed Dean’s own coat, and got him to put it on top, before handing him back his weapons. Then he put on his trench coat again.

“Sam is on his way. You’ll probably meet him half way.” He eased Dean down from the table he’d been tied to, guiding him around the leeches wriggling dully on the floor.

_You’ll_?

“Cas,” Dean said, but then they were out of the door, and Cas was guiding him to the Impala and leaning him against her.

“Are you sure you’ll be able to drive? I can follow you until we see Sam, and….”

Dammit. “No. No, I’m not okay. None of this is okay. I want you to come back with me. With us.”

Cas stepped away. “Dean.”

Dean followed, grabbing hold of Cas’s coat. “Stop it, Cas, dammit, please. I fucked up, okay? I’m trying to…. I never should have said that, you have to know I didn’t mean it.”

Now, Cas did look at him, and it was the same look he had just before he’d left.

“You meant it, Dean. We both know it. All this time, I’ve thought...hoped, that I was family to you. That I might have earned a place with you, and Sam. But I.. I was fooling myself, and it took you finally being completely honest with me to realise it.”

“I was never your family, Dean. Just your resource.”

He stepped away, and Dean let go, too stunned to do anything else.

“Cas,” he said, but the angel shook his head. 

“I will still always come if you call, Dean, if I can. If you or Sam have need of me. But other than that…”

He motioned to his truck. “I’ll follow you until we reach Sam. Please give him my regards.”

Dean watched, chest aching, as Cas got into his truck, and turned it around so that Dean could drive off first, allowing him to follow.

He’d done it. He’d finally broke something so badly that he couldn’t fix it. All he could think of was how hard he’d made Cas work for his forgiveness back after the souls fiasco, even when he was mentally ill in that asylum (and fuck, he deserved to go back to hell for rejecting Cas’s apology so brutally, knocking that game out of his hands).

Like going mad to save Sam in the first place wasn’t apology enough.

This…. He had no right to expect anything more from Cas, given all the years he’d demanded it, for Cas to let him off Scot free for all his shit but drag him for his mistakes until he, Dean, was satisfied Cas’s ledger was balanced again or they needed him for something.

Cas actually wanted to be a part of this family? When all it did was hurt and use him?

If Dean had anything decent left in him, he should let Cas go and wish him luck, let him get clear of the clusterfuck that was being a Winchester.

Because Cas…. He was a Winchester, or he had been, and Dean was starting to think that it wasn’t so much Cas being there for all the things going wrong in their lives, as them being there for all the things that went wrong in his.

Right from convincing him to side with them against Heaven, causing him to fall, and even then, that hadn’t been enough.

If Cas had any smarts, he’d run. Dump his phone, change that truck and go into hiding someplace where nobody named Winchester could ever find him.

Shut down that damn celestial radio as well, and just live out his life.

So Dean didn’t go after Cas, even though he wanted to. Even though every part of him was screaming not to let this be another of his mistakes, because if he let Cas go now, then truly the angel was lost to them.

The damage was already done, and Dean wasn’t gone to let himself inflict any more.

He got in his car, and eased past the truck, heading back the way he’d come.

Cas was as good as his word, tailing Dean the next few hours until a car coming towards them flashed its lights and Dean indicated then pulled over.

Cas didn’t. He stopped, but still on the road, and Dean knew he was watching to make sure it was Sam, and that they were okay.

Sam pulled Dean into a hug the minute they were both out of their cars, and then held him at arms length to check him over.

“You okay? What the hell happened?”

“Later,” Dean said. He turned to look but sure enough Cas was pulling away again, driving past them, and he didn’t look over once.

“Wait,” Sam said, staring after the angel in confusion. “He’s not coming back with us? Where’s he going?”

Dean felt his eyes start to burn as he watched Cas’s truck vanish down the road.

“Hopefully as far away from us as he can. Let’s go home, Sam. Just...let’s go home.”


End file.
